Crush Your New Years Resolutions by Using Your Strengths

Are you set up to crush your new year’s resolutions? Or have they already crushed you?

You—no matter what your Strengths are and because what of your Strengths are—can set and crush goals. In the new year and beyond.

Today, Alissa Carpenter of Not Ok That’s Ok joins us to shares her expert perspective on making meaningful New Year’s Resolutions and the strategies to truly follow through with them.

In her extensive work with Millennials in the workforce, Alissa has seen it all. From those who set and achieve effortlessly to those who struggle time and again to meet even the most basic objectives.

As a Millennial herself, she has come to rely on a distinguished yet flexible process that allows her and her clients to set meaningful resolutions and stick with them to the end.

Here she shares how you can do it too—starting with a good Set Up, using your Strengths, and getting past the Set Backs.

The Set Up :: Realism with a Why

You set yourself up to crush your New Year’s Resolutions when you start with goals that are both realistic and are connected to your bigger WHY. Apart from those two things, resolutions fizzle and fade.

Jenn is determined to get to the gym this year. She felt crummy over the holidays and her self-talk is spiralingly negative. She is passionate and resolved to make it happen. Last year, she averaged a gym day once or twice a month. This year, though, she is rearranging her schedule to make it every day before work.

It goes well at first, then, 2.5 weeks into it, she has thrown in the towel. Another resolution has fizzled out.

Alissa would say that Jenn was not set up for success from the start. She set herself up to fizzle. Her passion ignited a temporary commitment, but it was so far off from her typical routine that she couldn’t keep it up. It was not realistic.

Alissa says:

When you set up a goal that is not realistic, it will be a burden and you will hate it. Instead, look at your goals in terms of your current lifestyle and reality. Set a goal that is comfortable enough to achieve and challenging enough to push you.

That is where you will truly find success in your resolutions.

Alissa also emphasizes that no goal will be achieved without being directly connected to your WHY.

What is the reason and the drive behind your goal? What are you doing it for? Why should you keep investing time and energy when there are so many other things to do?

“Some people get caught up in the fluffiness of the WHY question,” says Alissa, “but it doesn’t have to be about a higher calling. In the exercising example, it can be as simple as wanting your clothes to fit better or to be confident with how you look.”

The Strengths: Make your HOW unique to you

No matter what your Strengths, Alissa is a big believer in one crucial goal-achieving strategy: write them down.

Whether you are an organized planner or a creative piler, your goals will not become a reality unless you write them down. Alissa says, “If you don’t write down your goals, you don’t even know if you have met them, and you don’t have any accountability to them.”

Write them on a calendar in detailed penmanship or scribble them on a sticky note that is shoved into a drawer. Writing down your goals increases your chances of success.

Alissa, for example, is wired with a slew of relationship-oriented Strengths. Apart from people, her goals are draining and monotonous. When she includes others into her goal strategies, she comes alive.

Because of her Includer Strength, she does best when she triages goals with others, sets up an accountability partner, and includes other people in her process. She does not like doing things alone—so much so that this year she has set up an exercise routine with her mom. When the car swings by to pick her up, there is nothing to do but jump inside.

If you are a planner, she says, be sure that your goals are Calendared specifically. If you are deliberative and cautious, plan in several alternate routes or contingency plans.

Whatever you do, be sure that your resolutions and goals align with the way you are wired. Apart from your Strengths, your resolutions will feel burdensome and oppressive. When the process aligns with your Strengths, it will be a joy to achieve them.

The Setbacks: Start Small and Re-evaluate

Setbacks are unavoidable. There will be days when backward progress overcomes the forward momentum.

When those setbacks come upon you, check back in with your WHY. Remind yourself of the driving reasons behind your resolutions.

Check-in with the calendar and process. Evaluate how it is going and how you are feeling. Do most days bring progress? Do they bring energy and satisfaction as you march toward your goal? Or is it overwhelming and overbearing?

“Perhaps,” Alissa says, “you may need to pivot. And that’s OK.”

Ensure that you are breaking your goal into manageable pieces. What are the steps you can take today, tomorrow, and the next day?

Those incremental steps will accumulate to overcome your setbacks and get you back on track.

This year, you may already feel behind on your New Year’s Resolutions. That’s OK. There is nothing magical about January 1. January 28 can be your day. Or April 2 or August 15.

This year, set yourself up for success—make realistic goals, attached to your WHY, with processes aligned to your Strengths. Set yourself up to crush your resolutions.

Alissa Carpenter founded Everything’s Not Ok and That’s Ok Coaching in 2015 after more than a decade of work in higher education. She has advised Millennial and GenZ students at top-tier institutions, including the Wharton School and Pennsylvania State University. She now offers professional development and career exploration to companies, alumni groups, and individuals across the country.